After every official committee and panel investigating the 2012 Benghazi attack, including ones led by Republicans, debunked the many right-wing conspiracy theories surrounding the incident, conservative activists demanded that the House GOP establish a new special committee to look into the attack, hoping that the group, led by Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., would finally confirm their suspicions of foul play by the Obama administration.

The military commanders on the Citizens Committee on Benghazi reacted with skepticism to the announcement Thursday afternoon that the House Select Committee on Benghazi has scheduled a hearing, contending the congressional panel led by Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., is not uncovering the truth behind the deadly episode that resulted in the death of an American ambassador.

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Retired U.S Navy Adm. James “Ace” Lyons, a founding member of the citizens’ commission – which WND reported has been conducting its own investigation for the past year and a half to ensure Congress uncovers the truth – said the “idea that government agency stonewalling continuing now for over two years is the reason Gowdy’s committee can’t make progress is pure nonsense.”

Lyons, a former four-star admiral who served as commander-in-chief of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, said he was speaking for himself, not on behalf of the commission.

“Let’s say it clearly,” he told WND. “This is a continued cover-up. You have to take the wraps off and you have to go for the jugular. Is Gowdy so incapable and ineffective that he can’t boss these agency heads to comply with Congress’ mandate? Is he that ineffective?”

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Lyons, meanwhile, compared the situation to a subordinate military commander coming to him during a military engagement with the enemy and complaining that an important objective could not be taken because enemy resistance was too stiff.

“I’d tell that subordinate commander to make sure the door didn’t hit him in the rear on the way out,” Lyons said. “The conclusion I’d come to is that I’d say, ‘You’re relieved,’ and I would find somebody that could break through.”

He said that if Gowdy “isn’t the man for the job because he’s being thwarted by some government bureaucrat that stonewalls Congress, then maybe we were wrong to be enthusiastic about Gowdy in the first place.”

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Roger Aronoff, editor of Accuracy in Media and another CCB founding member, expressed similar concerns.

“Gowdy has subpoena powers,” Aronoff noted. “So, why doesn’t Gowdy subpoena Hillary Clinton and Susan Rice to testify before the select committee in person? I guess it’s a positive sign that we learn Gowdy and the select committee staff have been meeting with State Department recently, but if nothing comes of it, then it’s obviously for naught.

“Gowdy needs to be aggressive and the select committee needs to get this job done,” he said.